Until next time: today, in summary

Thanks for your company this afternoon. We'll be back with politics live as events dictate.

Meanwhile, today, in brief:

Kevin Rudd had wanted to debate Tony Abbott at the National Press Club.

Abbott declined the invitation, so Rudd addressed the club on his own.

The prime minister delivered a speech about economic management in changing circumstances.

He nominated seven areas where Labor would pursue micro-economic reform in cooperation with business and trade unions, and argued that Australia should have a productivity growth target of 2%.

Rudd again foreshadowed changes to the carbon price and to Labor's policy on asylum boats, but declined to provide details ahead of Cabinet consideration.

He used his solo outing to frame Tony Abbott as negative at a time when the country needed him to be positive.

The Opposition responded in kind, branding the address a speech about nothing.

6.15am BST

Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey has gathered reporters to record his reaction to the Rudd speech.

Kevin Rudd said nothing. There is no concrete plan here, Hockey says.

A

productivity group hug

is not a plan.

It's a stunt.

We have a real plan. Kevin Rudd has lots of words. It's all guff. It's more Kevin Rudd rhetoric, more Kevin Rudd fakeness.

6.03am BST

Here's my first thoughts on the speech.

It was heavy on framing.

Rudd is keen to change the conversation in the economic policy debate (such as it currently exists). Since taking back the Labor leadership he's put down some conceptual markers about economic management - and they are interesting points he's making about the transition underway in the economy, and what we need to do to manage it. I think it's a good thing when leaders communicate at this big picture level - the conversation helps develop a community consensus around reform: what we need to do, why we need to do it. Rudd is also trying to shift the daily conversation away from debts and deficits and onto 'the vision thing'. The debt conversation, Labor loses - the vision conversation is much safer ground politically.

It was light on specifics.

There was very little done-and-dusted detail in this outing. There was a productivity growth target of 2%. Rudd is back to streamlining red and green tape (Julia Gillard went there several months ago but retreated slightly because of concern about how the states would administer environmental approvals without federal oversight). There was a commitment to more micro-economic reform (the unsexy but deeply necessary bit of economic policy change). We learned again that Rudd intends to change the clean energy package and asylum boats policy (we got boats in the Q&A session) - but we got no real specifics about when or how.

It was another attempt to narrowcast Tony Abbott as a leader without any positive vision.

Rudd has been very aggressive on this point since coming back as Labor leader. Abbott has been trying to make a transition from negative to positive for the past six months or so: this is Abbott's key pivot to the prime ministership. Rudd is determined to keep Abbott in the Mr Negative box - and let's face it, he has some source material to work with. Why is Rudd doing it? Two reasons. Labor's research suggests voters have some concerns about whether Abbott has all the requisite qualities required for the prime ministership - Rudd is pitching squarely to this doubt. And reducing Abbott boosts his own stocks - it reinforces the message that the prime minister is back in The Lodge.

Rudd on Tony Abbott

Today, I wanted to debate the future of our economy. Mr Abbott’s absence has made such a debate impossible.

Therefore, whenever you hear Mr Abbott, Mr Hockey, Mr Robb or anyone else try and run the lines on an Australian debt and deficit crisis, remember this was the day for Mr Abbott to defend his case.

Instead, Mr Abbott decided to cut and run.

Run away from the facts.

But keep pumping out the fear.

5.05am BST

Rudd's seven points on future competitiveness

The Prime Minister nominated seven policy issues where more work could be done through a new agreement between government, business and trade unions.

Number one:

Domestic electricity price regulation in Australia, and the impact of the current carbon price as well as the future availability of competitively priced domestic gas supplies are high on the agenda.

Australian electricity prices are too high by global standards. This affects the competitiveness of all firms large and small. Of course it also affects individual consumers.

Number two:

Labour market reform

We must continue to examine any unintended rigidities arising in the labour market.

Number three:

Business productivity.

The BCA itself has recently reported on problems in Australian business productivity, competent project management as well as the most effective use of capital by management. The future of the productivity agenda therefore does not in any way lie exclusively with the labour market.

Number four:

Red and green tape

We need a new approach to the regulatory impost on business from all levels of government. This particularly applies to multiple and conflicting environmental assessment requirements for state and federal governments. Surely it lies within our wit and wisdom to begin by integrating the assessment procedures and reports at present separately mandated by the Commonwealth and the states. Surely we should aim at having one single integrated assessment system.

Number five:

Education - more to do

We do .. need to do more with vocational education and training, particularly given the recent withdrawal of effort by many of the states.

Number six:

Infrastructure

We do need to embrace new forms of infrastructure financing and this forms part of an important agenda of work.

Number seven:

Small business - make the operating environment better

Updated at 6.33am BST

4.51am BST

The productivity target

Rudd on productivity growth and the new competitiveness agenda:

Because the China resources boom is coming off, Australia’s core economic strategy for the future must be one which diversifies our economy, by creating more jobs in manufacturing, food production, infrastructure, construction, and our many other services industries, rather than having all our eggs in just one basket – the resources and energy sector.

Relying on the lower dollar alone to boost competitiveness is insufficient for the great economic task that lies ahead.

That is why Australia must embrace today a new national competitiveness agenda.

If we fail to do so, in the years ahead there is a danger that Australia will begin to price itself out of international business.

The core of this new national competitiveness agenda must be a common agreement among us all that we must lift our annual productivity growth rate to 2 per cent or better for the future.

4.49am BST

Key themes of the speech: The end of the boom

Let's look at some key passages of the speech, starting with the end of the mining boom, and transition underway in the economy.

Rudd:

The truth is in 2013 – the China resources boom is over.

While the export of resource and commodity volumes are up, the prices we receive for them have now fallen almost 25 per cent since their peak and may well fall further.

This is reflected in our declining terms of trade from the historic highs we achieved only a year or so ago.

At their peak, our terms of trade were more than 60 per cent higher than their average across the 20th century.

Over the course of the boom beginning in 2002-03, these record terms of trade have delivered Australia around a 15 per cent boost in our national income.

Our producers have responded fantastically to these international price signals and have brought about arguably the single greatest investment phase in our history.

But now that investment phase is slowing.

Right now, we find ourselves at a cross-over point for our national economy.

A transition from an investment-intensive phase in our minerals and energy sector which has understandably pulled resources away from other sectors of the economy.

And a transition to a new phase of investment in other sectors of the economy, including the traded sector, that will now also be advantaged by a lower dollar.

Managing this economic transition is now a core task of Australian economic policy.

4.39am BST

Rudd has wrapped up now.

While I take stock, go back and highlight some key sections, and chase some reaction, here is the full textof Rudd's speech to the NPC.

Osborne also has a question about whether the government will boost unemployment benefits.

Rudd:

I don't want to create false promises.

He says cabinet is looking at that issue, and he'll announce any changes that are prudent in due course.

Updated at 4.53am BST

4.33am BST

In response to a question from Paul Osborne from AAP, Rudd confirms he'll go to PNG next week for a bilateral meeting.

4.31am BST

Paul Bongoirno from Ten wants to know about Labor party reform. Are you expecting an easy ride on your changes, Bongoirno asks Rudd?

No, says the prime minister, but this is

the pathway to the future.

Michelle Grattan from The Conversation asks if the 75 per cent trigger for a caucus leadership ballot is too high in opposition. Is a caucus super majority a good idea for opposition? Some people think that's too high.

Rudd digs in behind his reform proposal in the broad. Leadership stability is necessary, he says. I'm open to discussion about opposition, Rudd says. He's more preoccupied with what happens in government.

Updated at 5.18am BST

4.27am BST

Sid Maher from The Australian wants to know about boat arrivals. Can they be stopped? If so, how? When precisely is this summit that the Indonesian president foreshadowed last week? What will you say to countries of origin, like Afghanistan and Iran?

Rudd says the regional summit will be held in

months, possibly even shorter than that.

But that's up to the Indonesians.

He says the government is working on changes to the processing system including looking at regional visas - too easy access to countries within the region; and other changes to preserve the integrity of the system.

Rudd says there is a problem with the current number of arrivals. But he's not intending to produce a three word slogan as his solution. He'll keep us all posted.

4.22am BST

Kieran Gilbert from Sky News presses on workplace reform. Is this new, what you've foreshadowed today, or are you talking about status quo?

Rudd says the Fair Work Act is about the right balance. Within the FWA many of the mechanisms are not well used by business. His point is what can we do further within the existing framework.

Chris Uhlman from the ABC inquires about preselections. He mentions a radio interview from a candidate for Julia Gillard's seat of Lalor who has never lived in Melbourne, and has only just joined the Labor Party.

Rudd is not impressed with this interview. On the broader question of preselections:

My overwhelming preference remains local ballots.

4.09am BST

Malcolm Farr from news.com.au wants to know about politicians travel. Farr mentions a trip by Labor senator Trish Crossin to Europe at the taxpayers expense. Doesn't this undermine the public's confidence in politics?

Rudd says he doesn't know the detail of the Crossin trip, but notes if travel rules need a tighten then he's happy to tighten them. Politicians need to do serious work, not take a jolly on the taxpayer, he says.

4.06am BST

Questions to the prime minister

First question is from Laura Tingle from the Financial Review. Are you proposing an Accord like the 1980s? A new formal compact between unions, government and business?

No, Rudd says. We've moved on from the 1980s. I just want a doable list of micro-economic reform from business and unions.

It's a better way to go than throwing bricks at each other.

4.03am BST

Mr Abbott, Rudd says, has cut and run from today's debate. He wants to stick to fear, he's not fond of facts.

Rudd sums up his main points in the speech, and throws to questions.

3.58am BST

Rudd is passionate, he says, about small business. About skills and education and training.

I want to bring the nation together in this new competitiveness agenda.

Unlike .. someone else.

The nation's most formidable exponent of negative politics.

Now the prime minister is breaking out the powerpoint presentation.

Graphs galore.

Less graphs than he wanted.

Rudd says he was restrained by staff. Not too much programmatic specificity boss.

Rudd says Australia needs to have a goal of boosting productivity growth by 2 per cent.

He's flagging changes to the clean energy package, noting that electricity prices are too high by world standards.

He's also flagging some movement in workplace relations legislation. We can't have unintended rigidities in labour market regulation, Rudd says. Although he's talking about greenfields sites. The government has already promised some changes to regulations in this area after a review of the Fair Work Act. It's not clear whether he's suggesting Labor should now go further than what it has already foreshadowed.

Now he's onto the burden of regulation. He wants to move on red tape in cooperation with the premiers.

3.47am BST

Rudd says he's never believed in class warfare.

(That's a swipe at the former Treasurer Wayne Swan).

3.46am BST

Rudd's point is Australia is now in a new phase of the mining boom, and the Australian dollar is falling after a sustained period of parity with the US dollar.

The economy is switching gears. We have to consider those changes, and we have to boost national productivity.

Rudd:

Australia needs a new national competitiveness agenda with a new sense of urgency.

Global growth is sluggish, and economic growth in China is not what it once was.

Rudd says under his leadership, the budget will return to balance in the medium term, in 2015-16.

But we have to think about micro-economic reform, Rudd says. We can't rely on the falling dollar. Australia can't afford to price itself out of global business. We have to press on with reform - with business, unions and governments working together.

3.39am BST

The prime minister says he's an optimist. He makes no apology for his glass being half full.

Rudd says we have a strong economy, a stable society, underpinned by strong national security.

His opponent, by contrast, is glass half empty all the time. With Tony Abbott, it's all negative politics, the prime minister says. He ducked today's public debate at the press club.

The voters want clear, positive debate about the country's future.

Australia must take stock of the changing economic circumstances, and work out the best way forward.

This act of reckoning, Rudd reasons, is

an urgent necessity.

Right now, we find ourselves at a cross over point in our national economy.

3.34am BST

Kevin Rudd's address

The prime minister is being introduced by the NPC's president Laurie Wilson.

KIERAN GILBERT: Live in our Sydney studio is the Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey. Mr Hockey, thanks for your time. Why did Tony Abbott not just say yes and show up (to the National Press Club) today?

JOE HOCKEY: Because the Labor Party promised an election, Kevin Rudd has effectively disowned that promise and now he’s in for a stunt a day. I’d say to Mr Rudd, stop the stunts, start giving us solutions.

3.21am BST

The Liberal Party's federal director, Brian Loughnane.

Less supportive than Greg Rudd on balance - and considerably less supportive than Chris Bowen.

Brian Loughnane (@LoughnaneB)

Will @KRuddMP finally announce policy for families & small businesses at #NPC or will it be more baseless negative attacks & empty rhetoric?

As usual, he'll take a series of questions from reporters after the address.

Rudd's brother Greg has been spotted in the audience down at the club - fresh from a declaration that Labor can't win the election.

Greg Rudd has reportedly told a TV program due to be broadcast this weekend:

Labor is going to have a very bad defeat. But I think Labor has to die before it can grow, before it can rebuild.

Great to have that confidence from the family. Older brother Greg is an independent candidate for the senate in Queensland.

2.59am BST

Good afternoon and welcome to our live coverage of the prime minister's lunchtime address to the National Press Club.

Rudd's speech comes after a meeting yesterday of the ALP's national executive. Labor has made it known that it has now switched to a campaign footing - a statement being read as code for an election in August or September.

(Given it feels like we never actually left the 2010 election, it's hard to know what practical difference this statement makes. But let's not digress. Let's power on ahead.)

The ALP's president Jenny McAllister said this at the conclusion of yesterday's national executive:

From today, the ALP has placed itself on a full campaign footing. This occurs towards the end of every electoral cycle … the day-to-day work of local party branches should now be directed towards campaigning for a Labor win as their immediate priority.

Despite my all too evident campaign fatigue, there is of course a practical dimension to Labor's statement post national executive, and it's this, as my colleague, Guardian Australia political editor Lenore Taylor reports this morning:

The Labor party appears likely to intervene in pre-selections for safe seats in Victoria and New South Wales as it clears the decks for an election in late August or September.

In a bid to quash party infighting and focus efforts on an election it now considers winnable, the party’s national executive formally placed Labor on “full campaign footing” at a meeting in Sydney on Wednesday.

The meeting also empowered the national secretary, George Wright, to decide whether the organisation needs to intervene in pre-selections in the slew of seats vacated by recent ministerial resignations and whether it should re-open pre-selections in seats the party had effectively written off when it appeared headed for a landslide defeat.